“We weren’t competitive enough,” Babcock said. “You got to get yourself ready to compete. As a group we weren’t good enough. As the coach of the group you got to look at yourself; this was unacceptable.”

Babcock called it their worst game since the start of the New Year. He said the Rangers were more dialed in while moving three points ahead of the Red Wings (29-22-13) in the multi-team chase for playoff spots in the Eastern Conference.

“We should expect more out of ourselves,” defenseman Niklas Kronwall said.

Henrik Lundqvist made 30 saves for his second shutout in less than eight weeks against the Red Wings, the 49th of his career, and his 300th NHL win. Chris Kreider scored twice in the third period against Jimmy Howard to seal the win. The Rangers swept the three-game season series, holding Detroit scoreless in the final 144:58.

Babcock said he was surprised at what unfolded following Friday’s season-high output in a 7-4 victory over New Jersey.

“But that’s the thing about this business,” he said. “Every time you think you got ’er going, you don’t. Just stay scared and life’s good.”

The Red Wings’ top line of David Legwand, Johan Franzen and Gustav Nyquist, which accounted for 11 points less than 48 hours earlier, had trouble getting through the neutral zone, as did everyone else in red and white. Getting clean entries also was a problem on the power play, which went 0-for-3, with three shots in 5:24.

“They trap good, but I thought we were too cute,” Nyquist said. “We tried to dangle our way through instead of chipping it in and getting on their D. Way too many turnovers.”

Nyquist’s turnover led to a deflating goal just 14 seconds into the third period, when Kreider tipped in a point shot by Ryan McDonagh to make it 2-0. Kreider sealed it with his 16th goal at 12:11.

“Tough goal to give up when we’re coming out for the third and behind one goal,” Nyquist said. “Comes off the boards and I make a bad play, try to find Leggy coming in a good spot in the middle but I can’t make the play. We get a couple whacks at it, it goes to the point and they tip it in.”

Lundqvist is about the last goaltender you want to face needing two goals in less than a period.

“Obviously, he’s one of the best goalies in the league,” Kronwall said. “Plays a little different than other goalies. You need a lot more traffic. We had a few chances but not enough to make them count.”

Said Howard: “You got to make it tough on him, got to take away his eyes; he saw a lot of shots. You’re not going to score on him from 60 feet when he can see it the whole way.”

The Red Wings played catch-up almost the entire game after Brian Boyle scored at 5:14 of the first period on a shot from the slot that deflected in off Brendan Smith’s stick.

It turns out, that’s all the support Lundqvist needed. The Red Wings were shut out for the eighth time this season.

“All over the ice we put a lot of pressure on them,” Lundqvist said.

Conversely, the Red Wings didn’t put a lot of heat on Lundqvist, Babccok said, as they didn’t compete physically in the offensive zone and didn’t make hard on the opposing goalie.

“When I look at our game, for the group we have, we’ve really competed hard and done good things,” Babcock said. “Tonight, that wasn’t good enough, period. We had a good enough team here to play better than we did.”